Little enclosure (temporary parquet)

2022
Dunedin Public Art Gallery, Ōtepoti Dunedin

Part of Memories of a Naturalist, curated by Simon Palenski.
With Ayesha Green, Kate Mary Ogston, Nova Paul, George Malcolm Thomson, and Keri Whaitiri.

Little enclosure (temporary parquet) considers the dual origins of the word ‘parquet’ in relation to the way animals transgress human-made boundaries within contemporary and historical contexts, and how those momentary breaks are marked in material and language. Parquet can describe a wooden floor made from small pieces affixed to a supporting structure, but it also historically referred to the space in a French courtroom where the parties at trial interacted with each other and the judge. Areas where animals and humans co-exist in close proximity also reproduce these types of distinctions, through environmental aspects no less formal but sometimes more ephemeral: a taped-up no dogs sign makes a dog’s presence ‘wrong’, worms don’t ‘belong’ when they are upon the gridded concrete pavement during a downpour. The human response to animals who we consider to have overstepped has obviously varied widely – from ecclesiastic animal trials of Renaissance Europe, to the bemused reportage of wild animals who have made their way into our milleu – and so have the residues of these responses, interpreted in Little enclosure as an unevenly layered surface of documents, trackways, ramps, veneers, casts, and signs.

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newspaper grid, bronze cat and dog footprints, papier mâché ‘no dogs’ signs, masking tape potato chips, pewter worms, various documents and ephemera (risograph and laser-print), A4 and A3 painted plywood ramps, mouse and duck silicon trackways from Acorn Naturalists, milliput hat, nylon and leather bird leashes

Memories of a Naturalist, text by Simon Palenski [PDF: 248kbs]